President Of Anti-Tobacco Organization Says “Evidence is Unequivocal That Vaping Is Much Safer Than Smoking.”

Linda Bauld, President of the Society for Research on Nicotine and Tobacco Europe, recently published an article that takes aim at the misinformation surrounding vaping

As vaping continues to become more common, the debate over whether or not e-cigarettes are dangerous rages on, at least in the media. According to a leading mind in the field of nicotine and tobacco control, Dr. Linda Bauld, the evidence clearly shows that vaping dramatically reduces harm exposure. Unfortunately, media outlets are far more concerned with selling the potential risks over acknowledging their apparent benefits.

Dr. Bauld believes that the negative reputation perpetuated by the media is ultimately costing lives since it reinforces the false belief that vaping and smoking are similar in risk. After all, if you believe that smoking is just as dangerous as vaping, why ever attempt a switch? Luckily, she also thinks that 2017 consistently established that vaping is genuinely much safer than tobacco. She hopes that this movement will carry into 2018 and finally end the stigma that goes along with vaping.

Vaping In 2017

According to Linda Bauld, 2017 was the most important year yet in the fight for vaping rights. For starters, we finally had some evidence of the long-term effects of vaping on former smokers. The study, which was published by the American College of Physicians, and funded by Cancer Research UK, found that there was a massive reduction in the presence of carcinogens and other toxins after the study’s minimum cessation period of 16 months. But they also found that these results were contingent on whether or not participants had completely stopped smoking. Bolstering these claims was another study from last year that compared the toxins in vapor and smoke. The researchers from Ohio State’s Medical Center found that the cancer risk of vaping is about 99% less than that of smoking.

Following this pattern of positive results, both the Royal College of General Practitioners and the British Medical Association released new policies that claim vaping is a legitimate way for smokers to increase their chances of quitting. To round out the year Public Health England’s annual Stoptober campaign formally endorsed vaping as a smoking cessation tool for the first time. Scotland even went as far as to have their Chief Medical Officer support a statement from Health Scotland that made it crystal clear vaping is much safer than smoking.

Changing Of The Tides

All of this research has led to some countries that are usually very skeptical of vaping to reconsider their stance. New Zealand was the most significant turnaround, with 2017 seeing them go from extremely strict, to a new policy that is much more similar to those in place in the vaping friendly UK. Their government even issued a new official position on vaping, saying “e-cigarettes are significantly less harmful than smoking tobacco.” Canada is another country that is changing their mind about vaping in light of the growing evidence. They’re currently in the process of legalizing e-cigarettes for the first time.

One of the primary reasons cited for the hesitance to support vaping as a smoking cessation tool is the belief that acceptance of e-cigarettes will normalize them enough to reverse the declining smoking rates. But these worries have now been shown to be mostly imaginary. 2017 gave us the first large-scale evidence proving that the overwhelming majority of teens who vape had previously been smokers. The study of over 60,000 teenagers found that less than 1% of everyday vapers had never smoked before picking up the habit. Improving these claims is the continuing steady decline in smoking rates in places like the UK and US where vaping is extremely common.

Implications

Linda Bauld is completely right, 2017 was a fantastic year for vaping rights. But what’s more important is that smokers understand that vaping is genuinely a much safer alternative. For a long time now the biggest problem facing vaping was the fact that so many people believe vaping to be just as, if not more, dangerous than smoking. In fact, a poll by Action on Smoking and Health (ASH) found that only a dismal 13% of the general public believe vaping to be much safer than smoking; Compared with 26% that think they have a similar level of risk.

There’s been positive information available for years, but the majority of headlines by large news outlets have focused solely on a potential risk. That’s why it’s no wonder so many people think that vaping is dangerous. But 2017 was such an important year for vaping because so many well-known institutions and government agencies came out in support of vaping for the first time. It’s these types of sources backing e-cigarettes that will lead to an increased acceptance among the general public, which will inevitably lead to more people quitting cigarettes for good.

Do you agree with Linda Bauld that 2017 was a fantastic year for vapers everywhere? What is the most important thing that needs to happen for vaping to gain further acceptance? What would make 2018 an even better year for vaping? Let us know what you think in the comments.

Dustin has been vaping for almost a decade. He found e-cigarettes in 2008 and quickly became drawn to them as an early adopter. He's been writing reviews ever since and has established himself as a well-versed authority on the subject.

4 Responses

Always a pleasure to hear from Linda Bauld, just admirable, here on the pos progress on vaping and its science, switching to vaping during pregnancy, non-existence of normalisation and the gateway theory, progress of science with the beautiful results from the CRUK study and the 60.000 kid study. Fantastic results for sure.

But policy making is not based so much on science as it is on the traditional thinking of “quit or die” stance, and while we have just 20% in UK and USA 5% and other countries =? that know how much vaping is safer than smoking we will not have so much progress in changing our policies. Science is the base of course but science does not change policies alone, thats altogether a totally different playground of rules, politics and money.

My view is that to be able to change the policies we have to focus much more on just two key factors. We have to focus more on the message which WHO, together with their >180 countries, sends out and received by most almost like a gospel of truth. Second major key is on informing the general public in our countries. To change the policies focus more on informing the general public and counteract the click-bait attitude from the press, their scaremongering tactics that attracts the public and influences their views.

By changing the public view is the a very important key factor, if not the most important, that we will be able to change, not only the general public, but in turn influence the policy makers. The change in the right direction will never be won by science alone, not even within WHO, CDC/FDA, but by the public view with better information. Though a good start, of course, that smokers know it because to change the policies in our countries we need the pressure from the general public to change our policies.

Though good, or in my opinion just fantastic, the stance on vaping from UK, its rather small part or isolated on our globe, even with some of the old commonwealth nations included (except Australia, which fines and jails people for vaping). The message as from UK most be a more global one.

Beth, Vape explosions are incredibly rare and usually a result of user error. The Government made it illegal for Vape Shops to teach people how to use their equipment. Do you not think this makes things less safe? While there are dangers of vaping compared to not, the question is the comparison to smoking. What data do you have that suggests more people are harmed by vaping than smoking?

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